Happy Birthday Cable Car

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The Emirates AirLine / Arabfly Dangleway (thank you, Diamond Geezer) opened a year ago today. It's not been without its controversies: you can see in our infographic that ridership dropped away after Olympics and Paralympics, and once the novelty value wore off.

Cost, too, has been an issue. Of the £60m needed to build it, £8m is coming from the EU, £36m is being provided by Emirates – but crucially, that money didn't all come up front, but is being handed over gradually up to 2021 – leaving the rest to be funded by TfL, i.e., the fare-and-taxpayer, despite Boris Johnson's promises it wouldn't cost us anything. Earlier this year it was also rumoured to be losing £50,000 a week, which is kind of annoying when even a City Hall briefing document (PDF) admits "ridership patterns are consistent with a tourist attraction rather than a commuter service". Such a conclusion isn't surprising when you consider the cable car costs more and takes longer than using the tube and DLR to similar stations, and has to close in high wind.

But do people like it? We've been trying to think of what else gets away with being expensive and a bit pointless because it's loved, but could only really come up with Bruce Forsyth. It's been a long week. Early TfL surveys put customer satisfaction at over 90%, but of course passengers will like a new shiny thing that's in use during the glow of London 2012. So we asked you on Facebook and Twitter. And you were fairly evenly split between thinking it a total waste of money and loving it (though some of that love is tempered with the admission you'll never ride it again). Some people still don't know where it is (between North Greenwich and Royal Victoria). Some sample comments:

Patrick Cain: Fun though pricey ride but terrible location. I wouldn't bother taking tourists again as it's such a trek and the scenery is embarrassing.

Joseph Treen: A low-budget London Eye with a utilitarian twist.

Lisa Luyten: Something a bit different that is really needed at that end of town!

Nick Bowman: It's great fun...terrific view...and when the redevelopment is down, will actually take you some where

Neil Littlejohns: Complete white elephant. Has been running at a loss since launch and is costing our city a fortune to run. Shut it down.

Next month Emirates will open an 'aviation experience' by the Greenwich terminal, featuring flight simulators, so there's one more reason to visit.

Obviously this reflects its minority status and was the January-March low period, but it's still quite high overall.

Gtram

Shut it down and give we Londoners our money back.

John Thompson

Would be useful if it wasn't in such a terrible location.

Mark Walley

I'd love to go on it at least once, but I'd have to be out that way to go on it anyway, and I can't think when I'm going to be out that way and will want to use it.

ianxn

Annoys me that it gets such prominent billing and valuable pixel space on the TfL web and mobile sites. I guess they need to advertise it to try to get ridership up or meet whatever contract they've entered into with Emirates, but in terms of ridership it is such a tiny part of London's transport, and really the web space should be allocated a little more in proportion to popularity of the services they run.

NaturalHealthGuy

We should have cable cars all over London to get us over the London traffic which only moves at 6mph. It would be so much cheaper to construct then building new underground links.

The Emirates cable car has been built simply as a tourist attraction and not a proper method of getting from A to B. If it wasn't a tourist attraction then why is a ride on it not covered by a a weekly Oyster Card? You are charged a premium to ride on it. And it's location is just a means to get from one failed tourist attraction (The Millennium Dome). Put cable cars over Zone 1 and 2 in London, have it included in normal Oyster Card Fares and you'll suddenly see it being used non-stop.